Legal Case Studies

Six Figure Sum for Driver after Collision with Tractor

A car driver has received a six-figure compensation settlement after he was seriously injured after a collision with a tractor on a country road.

Settlement Value: £520,000

Slater and Gordon Solicitor:Lorraine Finney is a Personal Injury Solicitor at Slater and Gordon Lawyers in Derby.

What happened: Our client was driving along a straight country road when he commenced an overtaking manoeuvre to pass a slow moving tractor.

Suddenly, and without warning, the tractor turned across our client’s path and, despite braking and swerving, a collision was unavoidable.

Impact: Our client needed his left hip re-building and sustained a broken shoulder and a broken wrist. He also snapped his sciatic nerve and has been left with a permanent drop foot.

He has not worked since the date of the accident, has had numerous operations so far and is likely to need further surgery in the future.

How Slater and Gordon helped: Liability was strenuously denied throughout the claim. Witness evidence was obtained, together with expert engineering evidence, and court proceedings were issued as the defendant refused to admit liability.

The matter was listed for a liability only trial, but this had to be vacated and a joint settlement meeting was arranged.

Two weeks before the trial, an offer to settle the claim was put forward but rejected. At the joint settlement meeting, our client achieved an award of ten times the original offer.

Careful selection of both counsel and the accident reconstruction expert undoubtedly benefited our client in this matter, without which the level of award would have been different, if the claim had succeeded at all.

Decision: Significant damages of £520,000 were recovered at a joint settlement meeting against a backdrop of a claim that had been defended throughout.

Slater and Gordon UK Limited is a company registered in England & Wales with registration number 07931918, VAT 125 446 327, registered office 50/52 Chancery Lane, London WC2A 1HL and is an approved Alternative Business Structure authorised and regulated by the Solicitors Regulation Authority and authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority for insurance mediation activity.